Zen Lee was frightened and stepped back from what he saw.
It was as though the person reflected in the puddle was not himself, but a desiccated corpse.
How could a person still be alive with such awful wounds?
He turned his body in disbelief and checked the other side of his abdomen. Even though he was a distance away and the lighting was poor, he could still see the penetrating wound and dark red bloodstains.
"This..." Zen Lee drew a deep breath, trying hard to calm himself.
He pressed his left hand against his left chest, feeling the frantic rhythm of his heart, a palpable surge of life coursing through him.
He then touched his skin. Beneath the slight coldness was a flowing warmth.
"What's happening?" he muttered with a frown.
He planned to seriously inspect his abdomen injury once more. He took two steps forward and suddenly paused. Clouds covered the moonlight of the black dot moon, making it too dark for his "serious inspection."
A memory fragment triggered as Zen Lee turned his head to look at the coffin-sized pit. It was a memory of getting a job from the Chamber Gang yesterday. The job was to steal a crystal with symbols inside it. They called it an Orbit.
"WHHH!" Zen Lee was stunned; he had seen a similar crystal with odd symbols inside it! With his memories jumbled, he tried hard to remember when he had bought a similar crystal. As the throbbing pain in his abdomen subsided bit by bit, he remembered.
It was a time when he was suffering the worst luck he had ever experienced in his life. It was so bad that he had lost his car keys four times in a day, arrived late to an important meeting, and occasionally tripped on his shoelaces.
After telling his mother about it, she had suggested he buy a crystal to get rid of bad karma. And, being himself, he bought the coolest-looking crystal. After bringing the crystal to his apartment, he remembered accidentally cutting himself with the sharp edge of the crystal, staining it with a bit of his blood.
The clouds receded and moonlight shined, making the dark alleyway more visible. Taking advantage of the situation, Zen Lee moved closer to the puddle.
This time, he seriously inspected his abdomen, not missing a single detail.
After a few rounds of inspection, he realized that apart from the original bloodstain, liquid was no longer flowing out of the grotesque wound. It appeared as though it had received the best hemostasis and bandaging. As for the slowly squirming blackish-red flesh and the discernible growth of skin and blood around the wound, it meant that the wound might take thirty to forty minutes, or maybe even two to three hours, before it would only leave a light scar.
"One of the cheats that transmigration brings?" Zen Lee curled up the right corner of his mouth as he murmured silently.
Following that, he let out a long sigh. Regardless, he was still alive!
"Yes, I should clean up the bloodstains on my abdomen, or I'll keep looking like a crime scene. It's fine scaring myself, but if I were to scare the officer who patrols the alleyways early in the morning, it would be quite problematic!"
He reached out with his hands and washed the bloodstains on his body with the puddle water. He felt a coldness as the wind picked up in the alleyway.
He looked around to find a corner to dry up, and his gaze landed on the bloody footprints and the coffin-sized pit.
"I should clean up the bloody footprints and fill the pit so it doesn't scare anyone." Zen Lee thought, considering that in this futuristic world, there might be ways to track someone through blood and DNA.
He used the dirty puddle water and the excavated soil next to some rusted metal pipes to clean the bloody footprints.
Just as he got closer to the coffin-sized pit, the distinctive smell of blood was present. He noticed moonlight glinting off a glass-like surface.
Zen Lee's eyes dilated. It was the crystal he bought at the antique shop.
After he recognized the crystal, a memory fragment flashed past his mind. After Raven accepted the thieving job, he had been given a photo of the Orbit. It was a red crystal with a symbol inside it. The symbol was similar to the math symbol for pi, but instead of two vertical lines, it had three.
A memory fragment flashed past his mind.
The black dot on the moon first appeared a few decades ago. Back then, the planet was just starting to recover from a series of devastating natural disasters and subsequent resource wars. At first, Orbits appeared; these crystal-like objects with symbols in them appeared across the world right after the black dot on the moon.
This caused millions of people in the vicinity of the Orbits to feel uncontrollable hunger. The people who consumed the Orbits started to complain about constant fatigue and sleepiness. This did not attract a lot of attention, and they were treated as crazy people.
But when they started to fall into an unnatural slumber, with no sign of waking up even days later, governments finally panicked. Of course, by then it was already too late—not that an early response could have made any difference. Orbit Creatures quickly overwhelmed national militaries, plunging the world into complete chaos.
No one knew what the Orbit was, what powers it contained, and how to resist it.
In the end, it was the Orbiters—those who survived the first trials of the Orbit and came back alive from their slumber—who put a stop to its rampage. Armed with miraculous abilities earned in their trials, they restored peace and created a semblance of a new order.
Of course, it was only the first of the catastrophes brought upon by the Orbit. But as far as Zen Lee was concerned, none of it had anything to do with him—not until a few hours ago when he had transmigrated to this bizarre world.
After remembering all the memories of Raven Scott, Zen Lee curled up the corners of his mouth. He had connected the dots. Even though he found it hard to believe that supernatural abilities existed, reality was different. He had transmigrated to another world, and this black crystal in the pit was an Orbit that contained a power that seemed to have a connection to his transmigration.
He reached his right hand into the pit, retrieved the Orbit, and put it in the right pocket of his linen pants. After some time, he had finished filling the pit with heaps of soil that were next to the rusted metal pipes. He looked down to examine his body. His hands were covered in dirt, and his linen pants were haggard. His upper body was naked, and feeling the chilly wind, he trembled.
"Staying in this alleyway will prove hazardous for me." Zen Lee knew that Raven Scott lived in an abandoned house at the edge of the outskirts.
After remembering the corresponding location, he walked towards the entrance of the alleyway to the street.
Across the street were houses. Some houses had PTVs parked in front; some were empty. He walked across the street, watching the streetlights that gleamed like jewels. After some time walking, enduring the icy asphalt with his bare feet, he arrived at the edge of the outskirts. Polluted air assaulted his lungs. He coughed a couple of times.
"F**k this!" After cursing, Zen Lee started running to an abandoned house that he found familiar.
After arriving at the abandoned house, he noticed that the weeds were overgrown and the asphalt was cracked and covered with moss.
He looked towards the house and exclaimed, "This looks more like a haunted house!" Remembering that Raven treated this haunted house as his home, he sighed.